Stressing the Web, ‘NewsHour’ Begins an Overhaul

Until recently, the employees who worked on the Web site of “The NewsHour With Jim Lehrer” on PBS were based in a building a brisk five-minute walk through city traffic from their on-air colleagues. The Web and television staffs interacted only at Mr. Lehrers annual holiday party. “They were all the recognizably young ones,” said Linda Winslow, the shows executive producer.

But in early November, the staffs were merged into a single 20-person bullpen, with four adjacent digital editing bays carved from what had been the correspondent Gwen Ifill‘s office.

Four days after the move, a gunman killed 13 people and wounded 43 others in a rampage at the Fort Hood Army post in Texas. As word spread, the digital employees were silent, to the bafflement of some of the TV producers, who had jumped for the telephones.

It turned out they were exchanging Twitter messages with the Army and a member of Congress. “We learned so much just having them in the room,” Ms. Winslow said.More…

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